Slumdog Millionaire rewrite

After recently watching the movie ‘Slumdog Millionaire,’ I was able to make several connections pertaining to cross cultural education. Not until I watched the movie this time, did I pay close attention to the details and realize that false assumptions and first impressions play a major role in the making of this movie.

Slumdog Millionaire is based off of the show ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.” In the movie, however, there is a contestant on the Indian version of the show. Unfortunately, before the contestants shot at the $20,000,000 question, he is interrogated by police, who have a feeling that he is cheating because they think that a “slumdog” like him couldn’t possibly know the answers, hence the title “Slumdog Millionaire.” Just as we learned in the cross cultural class this past semester, many people base their first impressions of someone solely on what they look like on the outside and where they are from, rather than actually getting to know the person before they can make any judgments about that particular person.

Although the contestant seemed to know just about all the answers with little hesitation, many people do not realize that he is answering these questions through flashbacks of incidents of his life which seemed to somehow help him in finding the correct answers. Some of these flashbacks include dealing with the death of his mother, becoming a beggar, travelling on top of trains, selling goods, picking pockets, and even working as dishwashers. When the contestant is actually on the show, and uses his ‘phone a friend’ lifeline to talk to Kumar, he is indecisive about whether to go with his instinct or to go with his friend’s thought. After much thought, the contestant decided to go with his initial instinct, and he ended up getting the question right, which made the police suspect he was cheating. Once again, this is the police’s initial instincts, not letting the contestant have the opportunity to explain himself for who he actually is.

Through many of the different class discussions that had to be completed online, we were given the opportunity to share our opinions, as well as read other students’ opinions relating to certain topics. Many students believed that assumptions play a huge role in cross cultural education, and that it is not right to judge someone based off of appearances. It is important to meet the person and get to know them before forming opinions, which in this case, the police did not do in terms of the contestant on the show. I thought it was a good idea to partake in class discussions so that students were given the opportunity to read other students’ opinions on certain topics, as well as voice their own opinions. Before taking this class, I had never actually thought in depth about several of the topics, and some of them really got me thinking. Before taking the class, I, as well as other students will probably admit, found myself making judgments or assumptions sometimes, without getting to know the person. This is just part of being a human, though. Everyone does it, and unfortunately there is nothing one can do about it.

I was able to somewhat understand what the contestant was going through when I traveled to Spain in high school with other students and my Spanish teacher, Mrs. Chenkus. When we were in Spain, I felt as if myself, along with everyone else in the group were being judeged or looked at because of what we were wearing or how we were acting. It was easy to tell that we were tourists, but we found at some places that we were not given the opportunity to explain where we were from or what we were doing there. At some places, I found myself overwhelmed because I felt as if I was not being welcomed. However, there were other destinations in which I found the complete opposite, and felt as if everyone was very nice and welcoming towards me. I suppose it is about what parts of the world you visit, as different countries or cities tend to be populated with different types of people. I think it is important to be able to explain who you actually are before you are looked at or talked about, just as the contestant in the movie should have been given the opportunity to do as well.

Another connection I was able to make after watching “Slumdog Millionaire” was that the movie was about the separation of rich and poor. Although the contestant was from a poor family and grew up having to go through a great amount of trouble, one would have never been able to know this had they seen his presence and responses to most of the answers. For the contestant, money was never an option for him, and unfortunately this is the dividing factor between the rich and the poor. This is extremely sad to realize because in reality, very rich people do not tend to associate with very poor people. Poor people have the hardest lives, and it is not fair because they are people as well. Although there are many rich people who like to help other people and share their wealth with those less fortunate people, there are also many rich people who like to flaunt their money and purchase unnecessary material items. This idea was clearly seen in the movie when the contestant kept having constant flashbacks when he was on the show. “Slumdog Millionaire” presents money as something of high value and a symbol of wealth in comparison to the symbols representing poverty.

After watching this movie again, I was glad I had come out with more opinions about the movie as it pertained to assumptions and first impressions. It was interesting to see how the movie relates to cross cultural and intercultural education. Just because of the contestant’s past experiences, does not mean that he does not have the knowledge to succeed on a game show. “Slumdog Millionaire” is a very inspirational movie in this aspect, in that first impressions are usually entirely false and do not explain the truth about any human being.

The Human Zoo

“The Human Zoo” is a book that was written in 1969 by a British zoologist, Desmond Morris, which was also made into a mini-series in the year 2000, as well as a movie in the year 2009. The book is a sequel to his earlier book, “The Naked Ape”. After reading into the book, I was able to understand and read about the nature of civilized society, more particularly in urban communities. The author of this book compares the community of a city to the animal population of a zoo, which both have their designated survival needs (Morris). I thought this was a very unique experiment because usually when studies are performed, there are communities of different types of people being compared. Instead, human beings and animals are being compared, which is a very interesting study. This relates to the cross cultural education class because it involves people being observed and looked at and how they relate to others, which was a huge part of the class this past semester. This book, “The Naked Ape” has become so popular that it became popular all over the world and became an international best seller, with translations in 23 languages (roboconsumer.wordpress.com)!

The author begins to describe the differences between the socialization among humans and the socialization among animals. “Under normal conditions, in their natural habitats, wild animals do not mutilate themselves, masturbate, attack their offspring, develop stomach ulcers, become fetishists, suffer from obesity, form homosexual pair-bonds, or commit murder (Morris)” This is completely different for humans, as human beings develop many illnesses that animals may not develop. Human beings also have to deal with many more issues concerning rape, suicide, homicide, or other types of physical abuse. I was able to understand that social issues and concerns come from evolution and the development of the human species, and that it is not completely humans’ fault that people act in which the way they do, solely because this is how humans have acted this way for so long. Furthermore, it is important to emphasize the fact that human life has been present on the earth for quite some time now, so it is necessary to understand and realize that some changes should be made, as cultures are being more brought together and less judgments should be made, because realistically, everyone is human beings and shares the same basic qualities of being a human.

The author of the book observed many similarities when dealing with both humans and animals. He was able to understand that both species have food and shelter available to them, although they may be different types of shelter (Morris). He also made a point to explain that they are both likely to have problems in developing social relationships with everyone. Humans cannot always get along with other humans, just as animals cannot always get along with other animals. This is just how society and nature works. There are always going to be some conflicts when forming relationships or bonds with other people/animals, as well as when trying to work with other people/animals. However, it is important to try and learn how to work with different people because this is becoming more and more popular in today’s society, as we learned in the cross cultural class. More and more today, it is common to find people of all different cultures and backgrounds in the classroom or at the workplace. Morris does a good job of explaining that many people act the way they do because that is how society has been in the past, and people simply do not want to bother with the transformation into a new and more peaceful society.

The mini-series “The Human Zoo” attempts to create a human approach to explain how people judge others, get along with others, and basically how humans interact as a whole with other human beings. The movie was a documentary that used hidden cameras to observe and conduct a psychological experiment of how certain people interact with other people. The participants did not know that they were being used as part of the psychological study. Many different behaviors and attitudes were observed that were very interesting to understand and examine.

I think both the book and the mini-series are great ideas for the cross cultural education class to read and watch. They would give the student another perspective about the idea of cross cultural education. When I was reading, I began thinking that not only is cross cultural education becoming more popular and accepted, but also the idea of interracial and gay families is becoming a more popular topic that is talked about. Although many children in school may get harassed because of their culture or what kind of clothes they are wearing, how they speak, or even the color of their skin, many other students are getting harassed because they are either gay, or they come from a family in which they may have gay parents, or gay people in their family. One may not realize, but this is the same sort of idea. Assumptions and judgments are made, sometimes without even getting to know the person, which is the same idea as if someone were to make a first impression of someone from another country without getting to know them beforehand. I took a class last semester in which this was a very popular topic to discuss. So many children have to deal with hate from other students just because of rumors or things made up.

I believe it is important for all students to take a class such as the cross cultural class in order to understand the importance of other cultures and other types of living in general. Some families may come from different countries, different sexual orientations, as well as different financial incomes, which can easily be topics that would cause students to be discriminated against unless those students are actually given the chance to explain who they are to their peers. I really enjoyed reading into “The Human Zoo” and watching clips from the mini-series, as this got me thinking about different ways some human beings interact with others.

Work Cited

Morris, Desmond (1996). The Human Zoo. Kodansha America, Inc.

Desmond Morris Quotes – The Human Zoo

Slumdog Millionaire Connection

Slumdog Millionaire Connection

After recently watching the movie ‘Slumdog Millionaire,’ I was able to make several connections pertaining to cross cultural education. Not until I watched the movie this time, did I pay close attention to the details and realize that false assumptions and first impressions play a major role in the making of this movie.

Slumdog Millionaire is based off of the show ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.” In the movie, however, there is a contestant on the Indian version of the show. Unfortunately, before the contestants shot at the $20,000,000 question, he is interrogated by police, who have a feeling that he is cheating because they think that a “slumdog” like him couldn’t possibly know the answers, hence the title “Slumdog Millionaire.” Just as we learned in the cross cultural class this past semester, many people base their first impressions of someone solely on what they look like on the outside and where they are from, rather than actually getting to know the person before they can make any judgments about that particular person.

Although the contestant seemed to know just about all the answers with little hesitation, many people do not realize that he is answering these questions through flashbacks of incidents of his life which seemed to somehow help him in finding the correct answers. Some of these flashbacks include dealing with the death of his mother, becoming a beggar, travelling on top of trains, selling goods, picking pockets, and even working as dishwashers. When the contestant is actually on the show, and uses his ‘phone a friend’ lifeline to talk to Kumar, he is indecisive about whether to go with his instinct or to go with his friend’s thought. After much thought, the contestant decided to go with his initial instinct, and he ended up getting the question right, which made the police suspect he was cheating. Once again, this is the police’s initial instincts, not letting the contestant have the opportunity to explain himself for who he actually is.

Through many of the different class discussions that had to be completed online, we were given the opportunity to share our opinions, as well as read other students’ opinions relating to certain topics. Many students believed that assumptions play a huge role in cross cultural education, and that it is not right to judge someone based off of appearances. It is important to meet the person and get to know them before forming opinions, which in this case, the police did not do in terms of the contestant on the show.

After watching this movie again, I was glad I had come out with more opinions about the movie as it pertained to assumptions and first impressions. It was interesting to see how the movie relates to cross cultural and intercultural education. Just because of the contestant’s past experiences, does not mean that he does not have the knowledge to succeed on a game show. “Slumdog Millionaire” is a very inspirational movie in this aspect, in that first impressions are usually entirely false and do not explain the truth about any human being.